Necturus beyeri Viosca, 1937

Common Names

Beyer's Mudpuppy (Bishop, 1943, Handb. Salamanders: 29).

Speckled Waterdog (Viosca, 1949, Pop. Sci. Bull., Louisiana Acad. Sci., 1: 9).

Beyer's Waterdog (Schmidt, 1953, Check List N. Am. Amph. Rept., Ed. 6: 13).

Gulf Coast Waterdog (Schmidt, 1953, Check List N. Am. Amph. Rept., Ed. 6: 13; Conant, Cagle, Goin, Lowe, Neill, Netting, Schmidt, Shaw, Stebbins, and Bogert, 1956, Copeia, 1956: 175; Conant, 1975, Field Guide Rept. Amph. E. Cent. N. Am., Ed. 2: 244; Collins, Huheey, Knight, and Smith, 1978, Herpetol. Circ., 7: 7; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 34; Collins, 1997, Herpetol. Circ., 25: 7; Crother, Boundy, Campbell, de Queiroz, Frost, Highton, Iverson, Meylan, Reeder, Seidel, Sites, Taggart, Tilley, and Wake, 2001 "2000", Herpetol. Circ., 29: 24; Collins and Taggart, 2009, Standard Common Curr. Sci. Names N. Am. Amph. Turtles Rept. Crocodil., ed. 6: 15; Tilley, Highton, and Wake, 2012, in Crother (ed.), Herpetol. Circ., 39: 28; Highton, Bonett, and Jockusch, 2017, in Crother (ed.), Herpetol. Circ., 43: 30).

Loeding's Mudpuppy ([no longer recognized] Bishop, 1943, Handb. Salamanders: 35).

Mobile Waterdog ([no longer recognized] Schmidt, 1953, Check List N. Am. Amph. Rept., Ed. 6: 13; Conant, Cagle, Goin, Lowe, Neill, Netting, Schmidt, Shaw, Stebbins, and Bogert, 1956, Copeia, 1956: 174).

Mobile Dwarf Waterdog ([no longer recognized] Collins, 1997, Herpetol. Circ., 25: 8).

Western Waterdog (Guyer, Murray, Bart, Crother, Chabarria, Bailey, and Dunn, 2020, J. Nat. Hist., London, 54: 32). 

Distribution

West-central Louisiana to northeastern and eastern Texas, USA. A related but apparently unnamed sister species found in the Florida Parishes of Louisiana and adjacent southwestern Mississippi. See comment for other components of former Necturus beyeri, now shown to be related to other species. 

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: United States of America, United States of America - Louisiana, United States of America - Texas

Likely/Controversially Present: United States of America - Mississippi

Endemic: United States of America

Comment

See comments under Necturus alabamensis. Bart, Bailey, Ashton, and Moler, 1997, J. Herpetol., 31: 192-201, suggested that this nominal taxon likely contains more than one species, USA, and suggested that populations on the eastern Gulf slope from Lake Pontchartrain through Ochlockonee river drainages be referred to as "Necturus sp. cf. beyeri". See account by Petranka, 1998, Salamand. U.S. Canada: 419–422. Guyer, 2005, in Lannoo (ed.), Amph. Declines: 867–868, provided a detailed account that summarized the biology and conservation literature. Raffaëlli, 2013, Urodeles du Monde, 2nd ed.: 220, provided a brief account, photograph, and map. Altig and McDiarmid, 2015, Handb. Larval Amph. US and Canada: 127, provided an account of larval morphology and biology. Chabarria, Murray, Moler, Bart, Crother, and Guyer, 2018, J. Zool. Syst. Evol. Res., 56: 352–363, discussed the systematics of this complex, restricting the name Necturus beyeri to western Louisiana and eastern Texas, USA. The authors recognized a (1) Pearl River species from the Pearl River drainage of southeastern Louisiana and south-central Mississippi; and (2) a Mobile River species from the eastern quarter of Mississippi through central and northern Alabama to northeastern Georgia, USA. The population bearing the old name Necturus lodingi was named as a species and was so treated by several authors (e.g., Chermock, 1952, Mus. Pap. Alabama Mus. Nat. Hist., 33: 23; Neill, 1954, Publ. Res. Div. Ross Allen’s Rept. Inst., 1: 75–97; Hecht, 1958, Proc. Staten Island Inst. Arts Sci., 21: 14) as conspecific with Necturus punctatus, although Gunter and Brode, 1964, Herpetologica, 20: 122–123, placed Necturus lodingi in the synonymy of Necturus alabamensis. Bart, Bailey, Ashton, and Moler, 1997, J. Herpetol., 31: 192–201, discussed taxonomic issues, problems, and delimited the ranges of Necturus beyeri and Necturus alabamensis, suggested that the situation from east of Lake Pontchartrain (Louisiana) to and including the Ochlockonee River drainage of the panhandle of Florida (and including the type locality of Necturus lodingi) was unresolved and deserved additional scrutiny, and likely involved more than one species.  They recommended that these coastal populations of small waterdogs collectively be referred to as "Necturus n. sp. cf. beyeri" until those populations could be taxonomically resolved. Guyer, 2005, in Lannoo (ed.), Amph. Declines: 873, provided a brief discussion and wrote that the usage "Necturus cf. beyeri" for populations within this region was consistent with Guyer's unpublished molecular data. This left the status of populations, including nominal Necturus lodingi (the oldest available name within the delimited range) unresolved (as well was leaving a big question of what "consistent with unpublished data" might mean in this context). 15 years later Dubois and Raffaëlli, 2012, Alytes, 28: 77–161, applied the name Necturus lodingi to this catch-all informal collection of populations, and included Necturus lodingi within a subgenus, Parvurus, which includes nominal Necturus lodingi, Necturus beyeri, and Necturus punctatus. Their association of the name Necturus lodingi, however, with populations extending east from the Mobile Bay into Florida was almost certainly incorrect as previous authors have suggested that multiple species are involved and one would think that if Necturus lodingi was conspecific with the rest of these populations that Bart and Guyer would have taken this easy remedy. Raffaëlli, 2013, Urodeles du Monde, 2nd ed.: 221, provided a brief account, photograph, and map in the sense of representing both nominal Necturus cf beyeri + Necturus lodingi. Guyer, Murray, Bart, Crother, Chabarria, Bailey, and Dunn, 2020, J. Nat. Hist., London, 54: 15–41, discussed the systematics of Gulf Coast Necturus and redelimited the species as here recognized. However, their Eastern Necturus beyeri is composed of drainage-loyal populations that are more closely related to Necturus cf. beyeri (Mobile population, which they, p. 28, noted the name Necturus lodingi is available), and the Western population of nominal Necturus beyeri is more closely related to two populations of Necturus maculosus, two populations of Eastern Necturus beyeri ("Ponchartrain" and "Pearl"). Raffaëlli, 2022, Salamanders & Newts of the World: 483–485, provided an account, summarizing systematics, life history, population status, and distribution (including a polygon map). Tighe, 2022, Smithson. Contrib. Zool., 654: 65–66, briefly discussed the location of paratypes of Necturus beyeri and Necturus lodingi. Bassett, 2023, Reptiles & Amphibians, 30(e18486): 1–18, provided an updated county distribution map for Texas, USA. 

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• For information on conservation status and distribution see the IUCN Redlist
• For information on distribution, habitat, and conservation see the Map of Life
• For related information on conservation and images as well as observations see iNaturalist